


The Secrets of the Universe

by IShipThem



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Always a Different Sex, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Trans Female Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-11
Updated: 2014-11-30
Packaged: 2017-12-26 06:31:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/962714
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IShipThem/pseuds/IShipThem
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loki smiled at him, giddy and open and utterly perfect. “Have you ever felt that way?” she inquired, turning on her side and speaking in secretive tones. "“Haven’t you ever discovered something so… so amazing, so breath-taking, and so vast that you feel like you’re never really going to get it? Something that challenges you so much it’s intimidating, but it’s also so exciting, and sometimes you just feel like standing there gaping like a total idiot because it’s just so beautiful?”</p><p>And Thor longed to posses the right words, the right way of joining them together - because yes. Yes he had found something like that. He only wished he knew how to tell her.</p><p>(Modern Setting AU where Loki is a trans woman. Couldn't get this scene out of my mind once I envisioned it, so I thought I could write it down as some silly fluff.)</p><p>(WARNING: The fic is only two scenes from a larger story I haven't written down. It's not actually a completed story)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I explained this universe a bit better at the end of the chapter.
> 
> REMEMBER: This isn't actually a completed story.

 

Thor didn’t know how Loki kept managing to drag him to these kind of things. He remembered a time when they couldn’t be in the same room without going at each other’s throats – now all that she had to do was poke him for a few seconds and flash her mischievous smile and before he noticed, he was doing everything she asked him to.

“One of these days, you’ll get us arrested,” Thor complained, following her up the fire stairs, his hand around hers as she pulled him along.

“Oh, stop being so _whiny_ ,” Loki teased, looking over her shoulder with amusement. “We met because you nearly got yourself into an alcoholic comma, and _I_ am going to get us arrested?”

Thor blushed and stammered, making the teenager laugh. Darcy and Jane had braided her hair earlier, and now that she’d left it loose, it was wavy and puffy from lying down. She’d left one braid intact, tied with a white ribbon by her jaw – together with her Golden Snitch pajamas, Loki looked dorky and relaxed and stupidly beautiful.

“C’mon, you slowpoke!” she called, pulling him harder. Thor laughed and hushed after her.

They got to the roof breathing slightly harder, the warm wind whipping their hair. The girl spread a blanket on the ground and they laid back side-by-side, sharing a single hotel pillow because Darcy had stolen Loki’s in their sleep.

“Did you seriously wake me up at three in the morning to look at the stars?” Thor asked, in a theatrical desolated tone, and she elbowed him.

“You can’t tell me it was much more fun in your room,” Loki replied, rolling her eyes at him and crossing her hands over her stomach. “How loud does your friend snore? How can you _sleep_ over that?”

Thor laughed, getting himself comfortable. “You just have to shove him a bit if he gets too noisy.”

“Hmmm,” she murmured, her head against his shoulder. “I tried to wake Darcy up, but she’s worse than a kid when she’s sleepy. And Jane’s got cramps. You’re my next best option.”

He raised an eyebrow at her. “I am flattered.”

Loki purred. “You should be.”

Thor smiled in her hair and fell silent next to her. The sky really was beautiful that night, and they spent a couple quiet minutes just appreciating it and each other’s company. Loki sighed contently and Thor sneaked a glance at her. He was still trying very hard to figure them out – to figure _her_ out – but in times like this, it didn’t feel important at all.

“You know, you never told me why you want to be an astrophysicist,” he pointed out, curiously, and Loki hummed thoughtfully.

“Haven’t I?” she wondered, glancing at him before looking back up at the sky. After spenting a couple minutes silent, seeming to work the words inside her head, she took a deep breath: “You know how people always say that looking at the night sky makes them feel small?”

“Yeah,” Thor agreed, nodding his head. He turned on his side and sat up on one elbow, leaning his cheek against his hand. “What about it?”

“It never made _me_ feel small.” replied Loki, with a cheeky smile, making the boy chuckle.

“What _do_ you feel, then?” he inquired, nudging her knee with his. She swatted at his thigh playfully.

“I feel… “ the girl murmured, dragging the word and biting her lips as she considered it. “Challenged.”

“Challenged?” Thor echoed, raising his eyebrows in surprise. “What do you mean?”

“Well, it’s…” Loki squirmed, trying to find a more comfortable position. “Think with me, okay? Just follow my thoughts in here.” Her eyes got this excited gleam, and her hands begun gesticulating wildly alongside her words. “It’s about epistemology, right? And some people – some branches of science – think that there is a _Truth_ , some pre-defined Reality that exists despite our perceptions, that exists beyond us. As in archeology, as if the secrets of the Universe are just hidden somewhere waiting for us to find it.”

She stopped to catch her breath, looking at him every five sentences to make sure he was still listening, and a smile begun to sneak up on her features. “But me? I don’t believe it,” she declared, grinning widely, and Thor found himself grinning back.

“There isn’t any sort of clockwork mechanism that’s making a set of celestial rules keep ticking. It isn’t about that!” the girl continued, enthusiastically, getting worked up. “We, and that’s the cool part, _we,_ human beings, _created_ the celestial rules, we didn’t _find_ them. We took this endless, frightening expansion of vacuum and cold, and we put names to it. We filled it with waves and radiation and gas. Scientists, that’s what we do.” She spread her palms against the sky, spying at the stars between her fingers. “We make order from chaos.”

Thor held his breath, watching as excitement lit up the girl’s features, making her brilliant and breathless.

“And when I look at the stars – that’s what I see.” She dropped her hands with a small sigh, turning her head to look at him, their faces really close. “I see a challenge. Because the Universe is uncaring and indifferent. We are nothing to It, our science is inconsequential. And it makes me want to force this, this Great Unknown into my little human boxes, force it to make sense and to work for me. And I know I can never do that, but that’s exactly why I want to do it so badly.”

Thor gulped, trying to swallow around the lump in his throat, and Loki dropped her eyes, as if trying to come back to Earth after skyrocketing into the moon. “Have you never felt that way?” she whispered, softly, pillowing her head on her arm.

“Haven’t you ever discovered something so… so _amazing,_ so breath-taking, and so _vast_ that you feel like you’re never really going to _get it?”_ She turned sideways towards him, talking lowly as if sharing a secret. “Something that challenges you so much it’s intimidating, but it’s also so _exciting_ , and sometimes you just feel like standing there gaping like a total idiot because it’s _just so beautiful?”_

Loki smiled at him, giddy and open and utterly perfect. “Have you ever felt that way?”

Thor let go of the breath he’d been holding. Slowly, almost barely daring to do it, he leaned forward. Loki didn’t move – only dropped her eyelids trying to track his motion. He closed his eyes and pressed his mouth against hers, enough pressure for heat to travel between them, softly capturing her bottom lip between his.

He heard when she held her breath, and felt it when she tensed. He drew back at once, and found Loki staring at him with wide eyes full of disbelief. Thor opened his mouth, trying to say something, as she touched her fingers to her lips looking shell-shocked. “Loki, I…”

“I should go,” Loki interrupted, standing up so abruptly she staggered a bit before regaining her balance. “I… I’ll talk to you later.”

“Loki, _wait!”_ Thor called, getting up hurriedly and trying to reach out for her. Before he was even on his feet, the girl was already halfway to the door, and she shut it on his face unceremoniously.

Thor banged his forehead against the wood and cursed silently.

“I have,” he whispered, disheartened, and Loki hurried down the stairs, trying to pretend she hadn’t heard those last two words.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My mind has ways of coming up with entire fanfics out of SINGLE LINES, with complete disregard as to whether I can write it or not. Lately it has come up with a modern AU where Loki is a pansexual trans woman who gets stuck with Thor for a group project at school (because he's Jane's ex-boyfriend and Jane is Loki's best friend, but srsly, WHAT'S UP WITH HER DATING TASTES). Initially, she hates his guts because he's a reckless idiot, not to mention a Nice GuyTM - however, turns out Thor CAN be a decent human being when he TRIES. He educates himself about social justice issues and generally grows up as a person, and they end up close friends.
> 
> At the point where this fic takes place, Thor doesn't know Loki is trans, which is partially why she freaks out when he kisses her. He does know she's pan, though. 
> 
> Incidentally, papa Odin knows Loki is trans, because he's acquaintances with mama Laufey, and knew Loki before she began identifying as a girl, when she was still a little kid. Laufey and Odin are business competitors, dislike each other intensely, and Odin thought that Laufey's decision to raise Loki according to her gender was irresponsible. He probably thinks that "'she' is actually a 'he'", and does not approve of hers and Thor's relationship. (Let it be said, Odin's SUPPOSED to be a douche in here, those opinions do not reflect the author's).
> 
> YES, MY BRAIN CAME UP WITH ALL OF THAT. And then I had the idea for THIS particular scene, because of course Loki would be a science geek, and I loved the dialogue I made for her so much, I couldn't resist.
> 
> Anyways, I hope you like. Feel free to tell me if you find any typos or stuff, and specially if I said anything offensive! Thanks~~


	2. Chapter 2

It was a Saturday afternoon and Loki was studying in her bedroom, tapping a red pen rhythmically to the corner of a book. That in itself wasn’t surprising – Loki was nothing if not ferociously dedicated to her studies – but Laufey, despite working unreasonable hours every week, paid close enough attention to her oldest daughter to notice something was wrong.

First off, she couldn’t remember the last Saturday afternoon she’d seen Loki in her pajamas. The girl had inherited Laufey’s chronic inability to stay put – her weekends were just as stock-full of commitments and chores as the rest of her week. If this was any regular day, Loki should’ve been showered and dressed and out the door before they even noticed she was up. Definitely not sitting in her bed clad in her cat-stamped shorts and a bra.

And as if that wasn’t suspicious enough, Laufey just kept noticing more odd details the more she watched her daughter: how she barely seemed to be reading the book in front of her, the way she kept squirming uncomfortably for no apparent reason, or the fact she’d apathetically waved her brother away when he’d asked to play together.

The boy had looked so shell-shocked, Laufey had to make him some warm, calming milk.

“So,” she called out at last, leaning on the open door and raising an eyebrow. “Want to tell me what’s wrong?”

Loki looked up from her book, blinked once, than frowned with a puzzled expression. “What makes you think there’s anything wrong?”

The woman shrugged, suppressing a faint smile. “You always forget I’ve known you for the past sixteen years.”

Loki rolled her eyes, long-suffering, but wriggled to the side to make room. Laufey toed out of her shoes, then wrapped one arm around her. “Well?”

Loki sighed with worry, letting her head fall back on her mother’s shoulder. “What if…” she began, wriggling her hands in her lap. “What if I don’t know how to tell you?”

Laufey pressed a kiss to her hair. “Then I’ll probably act a bit like a nostalgic fool, and worry about why you can’t tell me, but otherwise you know you can share as much as you are comfortable with.”

The girl laughed, straightening to look at her with a raised eyebrow. “Why would you act like a nostalgic fool?

Laufey pushed Loki’s hair always from her face, humming noncommittally. “Because you’ve always been able to tell me everything. If you’ve run into a trouble you feel like you can’t share, that officially means you’re growing up.” She leaned back against the headboard and smiled discreetly. “Your problems are becoming more complex.”

 Loki snorted, sitting up and crossing her legs. “Mom, I’m pretty sure I’ve dealt with more complex problems than this.”

“I know.” The woman reached out and squeezed her hand. “But it’s troubling you anyway, isn’t it?”

Loki’s face closed up with uneasiness. She squeezed Laufey’s hand back, but the gesture was purely automatic. “You’ll think it’s silly.”

“I _know_ it’s not silly.”

The girl hesitated still, munching on her lower lip, fiddling with her books. She took four or five deep breaths, each one an aborted attempt at forming words. There was something to her face that looked to Laufey, at the same time, oddly familiar and familiarly odd.

Then it came bursting out of her lips, in the hurried, too-fast way children used to confess to a misdeed. “I’m having boy problems.”

Laufey’s heart warmed like hot coal in her chest. So it was that her little Loki wasn’t quite all grown up yet. It was always good to know.

“Well, _finally,”_ she replied, dramatically falling on top of the girl. “You’ve never had relationship problems before. I was starting to feel useless.”

“ _Mom!”_ Loki complained, pushing her back into a sitting position. “I’m _serious.”_

“So am I,” Laufey said, obediently sitting up, but keeping one arm around the girl. “I wouldn’t _mind_ if you didn’t need advice because you weren’t dating to begin with, but your series of perfectly civil and friendly break-ups would make any mother feel redundant.”

Loki rolled her eyes, cozying up to her mom in a sullen mood. “You’re not redundant.”

Laufey kissed the crown of her head. “Thank you,” she said softly. “Now, tell me who’s this boy who’s been troubling you.”

The girl laid her head on Laufey’s shoulder with a great, theatrical sigh. “He goes to my school.”

“Okay.”

“And he’s straight.”

“All right.”

“And cis.”

There was a pause.

“Is that so.”

“That _is_ so, indeed,” Loki agreed, pleased that her mother got it so fast, spreading her hands in a helpless gesture. It wasn’t even that she’d never dated anyone who was cis or straight before. But she _hadn’t,_ actually, ever dated anyone who was both at the same time.

Or wanted to, for that matter.

“And does he know?” Laufey asked, tilting her head curiously. Loki shook hers no.

“I mean, he knows I’m pansexual,” she clarified, as that was, after all, a non-issue. Half the school knew she was into girls anyway, if a very limited number knew to use the proper word. “But he doesn’t know I’m trans.”

Laufey made a vague sound of acquiescence to show she was listening, then leaned back against the headboard, staring up at the ceiling. Loki was grateful to her mom for a lot of things, some lesser than others. This was of the lesser kind: she could clearly see the elegant, long lines of her jaw mimicked in Laufey’s bone structure. If this was what she looked like when leaning her head back, Loki should consider getting into modeling.

It was soothing knowing she looked so much like her mother. There were no echoes of a stranger meddling in her features.

“Do you like him?” Laufey asked, thoughtfully wrapping a lock of Loki’s hair around her finger.

The ghost memory of their barely-kiss flared back to life with a vengeance. Loki could suddenly smell him, generic hotel soap, leather and sun, and mint toothpaste in his breath. Electricity charged the places where their bodies almost met. It’d been so quick, but happened so slowly. Had she noticed he was going to kiss her? When his eyelashes, those beautiful long eyelashes, fluttered closed over his cheeks, when she could guess his heartbeat by the rhythm of his breath – hadn’t she realized it then?

And in that brief moment before secrets and fears came slamming back in, hadn’t she felt like gravity had lost its grip on her?

Her cheeks burned accusatorily. She turned, burying her face on her mom’s neck.

“Now, when did _that_ happen?” Laufey murmured slyly. Loki groaned.

“ _Lord_ , I don’t know,” she sighed, pressing a palm to her chest, a useless effort to stop her heart from doing the time wrap. When _had_ that happened? “I _hated_ him when we first met. But then he kind of just… kept on proving me wrong.”

He had _listened_ to her, Loki thought, heartsick. She’d never thought he would. And certainly not the way he had; not with his somber, solemn eyes, or his quiet, respectful words. Not with his honest friendship. She’d never thought being with him would make her feel giddy and too warm, just the right sight of buzzed. Or that she’d start making excuses to touch him.

Which must have something to do with his nice muscles, but also unsettling much to do with the way he held her. How his hand fitted around hers just so. It was the most munchy, sappy, diabetic-induced thing she’d ever said, but true either way.

And worst of all.

He made her feel _so good_ about herself. Not that she didn’t, usually, but Thor had just a way of making it go from steady floodlights to boisterous fireworks. It was the way he looked at her. Always so damn delighted, beaming at her arrival as one would at the sun itself.

Sweet Lord in Heavens, that _smile._ Loki wanted to sock him in the face every time he did that to her. No grown man had the right to look that goddamn cute.

“What are you thinking about?” Laufey asked in a gossipy whisper.

Loki frowned at the ceiling. “That I hate his stupid smile.”

Her mother began laughing heartily. “Oh, love.”

She sighed, stomach doing loops and twists inside of her. Heavy clouds of worry were condensing over her head. “I’ve never had to come out like this before,” Loki murmured. “I _think_ he’ll be cool, but you never know until you actually do it. Mom, if I tell him, and he lets it slip, the _whole school_ is gonna know.” She looked up at Laufey with huge eyes. “I don’t think I’m ready for that.”

Laufey’s heart squeezed tightly. She nodded, caressing Loki’s hair. They stayed in silence for a couple of minutes, leaning on one another, each lost in their own thoughts.

“Do you want my advice, then?” Laufey asked at last, gently, and Loki eagerly nodded. “Okay. Here’s the way I see it.”

She rearranged herself more comfortably. “Beginning on any relationship requires a certain degree of trust,” she told her daughter, solemnly. “But in this case, it’s a really big degree of trust. _I think,_ that you should only take the leap if you trust him enough to keep your secret.”  

Loki tipped her head back pensively. “That’s an asinine amount of trust, mom.”

“Well, is he worthy an asinine amount of trust?” Laufey replied, in that voice of hers that meant ‘Just try and be funny with me young lady’, but not in a way that threatened grounding. “Because you deserve nothing less.”

Honestly, Loki wasn’t sure. Maybe Thor _was_ worthy of it, but she wasn’t sure she _had_ that much trust in her. With Laufey, with Axel, it didn’t feel as much like trust as statement of fact. They had been there when trust was but her first instinct, when she was a child yet building her internal compass. Now, to rely on them was not even second nature. It was just nature.

With so many others, it was easy. With Jane, and Darcy. With everyone down at (Mis)Assigned. Like trust exercises in a soft mattress.

With Thor, it was more like – and Loki knew the feeling from experience – skydiving for the first time. Which, to some people, might sound romantic.  But to her, it just meant she didn’t want to hit the ground at over 200 m/s.

But she did want to jump.

Oh, how very dearly did she want to jump.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, everyone! Hope you all liked Mama Laufey =P
> 
> I had this sitting on my PC for a while, so I decided to go ahead and finish it. Don't know if I'll be revisiting the story, though. Maybe, if I ever manage to finish my Percy Jackson fic.
> 
> Axel, by the way, would be Loki's step-father.


End file.
